It would be an understatement to call myself a podcast junkie. I just simply love being able to listen and learn while I drive, clean dishes, fold laundry, get ready...I feel like I'm always listening to something. While this habit is largely a personal one, it's definitely come in handy in my role as a Digital Coach. Many teachers are looking for new ways to present engaging content to students and I've been fortunate enough to be able to make some podcast recommendations. Below are lists for Science and Social Studies of podcasts that are related to the content area. All of them are very well produced and do an excellent job fact-checking and investigating topics thoroughly.

Additionally, This American Life has created the ability to share up to 30 second clips in the form of a video. Find the episode you would like to clip on their website and their easy tool allows you to share segment of text from the episode by clicking "Share a clip".

​This then opens an editor for you to select the text segment you want using the transcript. After you select your portion, the site creates a video that highlights text as the episode reads. You can see below for a sample of what this looks like. What a great way to support English Language Learners!! While I wish the clips could be longer, this is a great start to making podcasts easier to use in the classroom.

Do you use podcasts in your classroom? Have any recommendations? Please feel free to add them to the comments below!

I can't believe it's already time to start thinking about InnEdCO 2018! I am extra excited this year since my new position has given me the opportunity to play more with edtech than ever before. As a Digital Coach, I have been able to support teachers from a variety of content areas with implementing new and innovative ideas into their instruction. It is so much fun to learn about other content areas and how technology can be best leveraged to enhance student learning. Because of this, I found myself struggling to narrow down which topics I want to present on this year. This forced me to really reflect on the work I've been doing and which skills and passions I have developed the most. With three session applications available, here is where I landed. I have included links to the proposals in the title - any and all feedback is always appreciated!

Access is Not Enough: a tech lens on equityThis session comes from my passion for examining equity alongside edtech. This year, I've experienced rolling out 1:1 Chromebooks in an urban setting and am finding that simply putting devices in the hands of students does not suddenly level the playing field. I really enjoy giving Ignite talks on topics I'm passionate about. I'm ready to share some of my learning around how we can do better as edtech to make sure all students are able to benefit.

Teaching Math in a Chromebook School​As a former math teacher, Chromebooks were never my first choice. It can be very difficult to have an entire math class facilitated via keyboard without a user-friendly math syntax system - very few things beat handwriting. I have had the amazing opportunity to support some math teachers in my position and am excited to facilitate a conversation with these teachers and others around how to best utilize a school-wide adopted device for a content that may lend itself well to a keyboard.

Hyperdocs: take your Google Drive to the next levelIn my previous and current position, I have found myself creating a ton of user guides using strategic linking and bookmarking. For example, my Making Schoology Pretty Guide allows users to navigate all of the different ways they can make Schoology more aesthetically pleasing by opening with a menu of topics. Since creating these guides, I have found myself supporting many teachers with creative lesson ideas that use these same skills. With so many examples, I thought it would be design a workshop where I guide participants on how to create their own Hyperdoc to meet their individual needs - teacher support, student support, personalized learning playlist, etc. I really wanted to push myself to do something bigger this year and I hope that this workshop will be a great avenue to expand my presentation types while providing participants with a useful and personalized learning experience.

I would love any and all feedback on my proposals! If you are looking to submit a proposal, the deadline is December 8th. You can submit your proposal using the directions here.

​What are you submitting as proposals to InnEdCO? Are you getting as excited as me? Feel free to use the comments to start a conversation about this amazing learning opportunity!

​As the school year starts, I like to center myself with great videos, podcasts, and other media. One of my favorite podcasts, Note to Self, recently shared a TED talk by host Manoush Zomorodi. As the digital coach for a 1:1 school, I love the way Manoush reminds us that just because you have technology, doesn't mean you have to always be on your device. In her talk, called Bored and Brilliant, Manoush uses illustrative storytelling to remind us of the value of being bored.

The last two days were filled with so much learning I was able to attend several incredible sessions that pushed my thinking and provided me with a ton of great resources. I'm excited to be able to share them with other teachers this school year.

Next, I attended a session by Noah Geisel focused on Chrome Extensions for literacy. As a math teacher, it was cool to check out the Chrome extensions Hypothesis, Diigo and Stackup and learn about how they can be useful to support learning in English classrooms. Each extension has slightly different functionality. Hypothesis and Diigo allow students to annotate articles and engage in conversations with their peers and the world. Stackup provides students with a online reading log that shows their time spent reading on different topics and the reading levels of the articles they have read online. It was fun to play with each of them and think about how they can be used in the classroom.

I also presented Ignite talk called "Why Educators Should Share". This was a reprised version of a previous Ignite talk I did during 2015, where I stressed the importance of teacher blogging and social media sharing. You can watch it below. I have also included the slides, which include the script in the notes.

After lunch, I attended Kevin Crogan's session, focused on planning learner progressions. His model helps teachers differentiate different levels of understanding and provide them with the vocabulary to guide learners in designing their own learning progression. You can find his presentationhere. Below is an example of his incredibly helpful planning document filled out.

I then attended a session by Galen Mitchell, focused on Universal Design. She did an incredible job illustrating the difference between differentiation and Universal Design and how we can approach creating lessons differently. Focusing on student choice and flexible lessons, Universal Design is a refreshing lens on providing students with lessons that support their learning as individuals. You can find her presentation here. Below is an excellent tweet that shows the comparison between differentiation and Universal Design.

Last, but not least I was able to attend a session on Online Tools for Math Discourse by Elena Jones. She did an amazing job modeling the tools presented by letting participants experience them as students. I was particularly impressed with the functionality of Formative and Desmos. Both of these tools are free! and I believe them to be game changers when it comes to math education and tech. Formative allows students to annotate their answers with their own handwriting, which I believe to be important for math. Desmos comes with a variety of prepared activities teachers can use that allow students to interact with graphs, inequalities and other mathematical representations. It was incredible to see the new tools that have been created since I left the classroom. It felt so good to return to my roots in teaching math and I am so excited to bring these tools to other math teachers. You can find the presentation here.

As always, it has been an incredible experience attending InnEd CO. This is by far my favorite conference and I feel so lucky to have a place where I am surrounded by incredible educators from across the country. I always walk away with new tools to bring to the classroom and much needed inspiration. Thank you to everyone who made this week so special! Can't wait to see you all again next year! Please feel free to share your thoughts and reflections in the comments below.

Day 2 at #InnEdCO17 was an incredible day of connections and storytelling. I started the morning with Sean Wybrant (Colorado Teacher of the Year) and his session on crafting heroes. As the Colorado teacher of the year, he decided to use the role to serve as a voice for the teachers of Colorado. In his session, he told the story of his student's journey to creating an interactive, periodic table using a variety of augmented reality hardware. For me, the most impactful part of his presentation was the emphasis on sharing your story, especially before it feels like a polished product. Like the many iterations of the Iron Man suit, it is important to understand that there will be constant iterations of your story. The most important thing is to start sharing your story in the first place. Too often, negative headlines take over the educational narrative. In order to overcome this, educators across the country need to share the positive stories they have as often as they occur. We need to not led perfection become the enemy of good enough and reclaim the education headlines through our intentional storytelling.

Next, I attended the inspirational Keynote of Rusul Alrubail. While I have been fortunate enough to be exposed to many equity-focused keynotes over the past year (see previous blog posts), I feel lucky to have made such a personal connection to Rusul. She shared an inspiring message focused on elevating student voice, kindness, empathy and the importance of representation and authenticity as an educator. Below is a collection of my favorite tweets from Rusul's keynote.

​I was also able to attend a session on personalized learning by Ben Wilkoff. His session provided insight into the vision for meaningful, relevant, personalized learning for all learners in Aurora Public Schools. This includes a connected learning, with a device that they feel confident using, in a learning space that meets their needs, making things that matter to them. This same learner is connected to a community of other learners and has ownership over their work and data that they can then share with others. These skills can then be recognized via microcredentials, allowing the learner to move their own boxes and engage meet their personal learning goals. I found myself reflecting on how these characteristics are also conducive to a creative and innovative work environment. You can find Ben's presentation here to click into examples of these concepts.

​Last, but not least, I engaged in a conversation with Mustefa, an innovative strategist, around design thinking and the importance of understanding context to solve a problem. Very often companies come up with complicated procedures for engaging in design work, when a straightforward and simple thinking process can help us solve our problems. Once we can identify our context, we can then consider the challenges that come up and the corresponding opportunities and risks for each challenge. From there, we can take action in the ways that best support reaching our intended goal. Mustefa emphasized how it is not necessary to engage in a complex set of structures to really tackle our problems, including those involving systems of inequity. Once we have a solid understanding of the context, anything is possible.

How has your week been at InnEd CO? What great equity-focused Keynotes have you heard?
​Please share in the comments below!

This week, I am lucky enough to attend InnEdCO for another year. I am always so excited to see so many familiar faces and add new people to my network of incredible educators. Below are some highlights from Day 1.

First, I have been able to spend the day with so many incredible people - both old friends and new friends. As a part of a challenge, I took selfies with all six members of the DPS Edtech team (one of my favorite groups of people). They are a truly incredible group and I have felt so fortunate to know over my career. It is incredible to think that I got started with presenting on educational technology with them back in 2013, the fall after I started my master's degree.

I also had the chance to hear Ken Shelton present an opening keynote on the importance of student voice in our schools. He talked about equipping students with the tools they need to amplify their voice to share with the world. There is great power and responsibility in sharing our stories and he did a wonderful job illustrating this idea with relevant stories and touching student narratives. You can watch videos of some of his talks on his website.

I was also able to attend a session on #techquity from Kevin Riebau. This session touched on finding the intersection of Essential Skills and Culturally Relevant Education to create better instruction to prepare students for success. I greatly appreciated the combination of a formative check-for-understanding and application time built-in to the session. This made sure they could pace with the audience understanding and provide an opportunity for the new learning to stick. You can check out the presentationhere.

I was also able to present my work on #theGoogleGames in a snapshot session. I had a lot of fun sharing this project with others, and hope that it inspires other to experiment with gamification for their professional development. You can find more information in my presentation slides or in my previous blog post.

What are your highlights from Day 1 at #InnEdCO17? Please share them in the comments below!

As the year winds down, I hope that teachers across the country are taking some time to relax and prepare for summer. In the case you have some time to watch some great keynotes, I've decided to share two that I loved from the 2017 Carnegie Summit. I attended the summit in late March, but these keynotes have still stuck with me.

​The first keynote features Becky Margiotta and Joe McCannon, who share their model for taking smaller, successful change ideas and scaling them up. Joe provides the general model, while Becky illustrates their approach through a touching story about her work finding housing for the homeless in cities across the United States.

The second video, is from Jeff Duncan-Andrade. He has given similar talks before about the importance of relationships when working with students (you may have seen is roses in the concrete TED Talk). What struck me about this video in particular, what his presentation on how focusing on increasing student sense of cultural identity had led a group of Maori students in New Zealand to increase their academic outcomes. This is a must-watch if you are feeling bogged down by the weight of the year and need a good reminder of why you are in education.

What keynotes and TED Talks have stuck with you? Post your favorites in the comments below!

​When I was in the classroom, I remember April feeling like one of the longest months. This year, I find myself reflecting upon my teaching practice, specifically the technology I used in my classroom. While I was always trying new things, I decided to go back through my blog archives and pick out some of my favorite tech tools. It reminds me how much I miss my students and the ways we were able to work together to use our technology for learning. Check out each entry below to learn more about how I used it in my classroom. Enjoy!

I was fortunate enough to attend the 2017 Carnegie Summit on Improvement in Education in San Francisco for the past two days. This conference focused on using the tools of Improvement Science to help organizations solve larger problems, especially those related to issues of equity in education. While the two days were packed full of learning, I had some key takeaways from the experience.

First, many organizations are working on creating effective online communities of practice, but have limited success with implementation. It is clear that there is great potential in using the unique tools of an online space to create meaningful extended learning experiences. Participants are able to engage with different kinds of media, increase processing time and provide each other with feedback that is often neglected during face-to-face sessions. The trouble seems to be in making sure the online space is created and launched in a way that has the intended outcomes for participants. This is a problem of practice that I am very interested in studying. Since I am not familiar with Improvement Science, it was also recommended that I practice Improvement Science personally before looking to extend it to others. As a result of the conference, I have decided to practice using Improvement Science to systematically approach this problem and share my experiences and reflections with others. Hopefully, I will be able to gain some useful insights that help us better leverage the power of online communities to drive work forward.

Second, I was particularly impressed by the work of Becky Kanis Margiott and Joe McCannon and the Billions Institute. Their keynote focused on unleash great ideas in order to positively impact the world on a grand scale. Joe did an excellent job explaining the larger concept of scaling-up great work while Becky provided a concrete example through her work helping house 100,000 of the most vulnerable homeless people across the United States. The back-and-forth format did an excellent job providing a clear vision for how we can expand successful initiatives to have a greater impact. I would be leaving out a major asset to this keynote if I did not mention how vulnerable Becky was during the presentation. I was honored to hear her story of coming out and leaving the military, accompanied by several quips that played upon lesbian stereotypes. Her unapologetic and authentic approach to her story made it both memorable and inspiring.

Last, but not least, was the final keynote of Jeff Duncan-Andrade. He made incredibly profound statements, focused on the incredibly alarming inequity that plagues the American education system. Many of the elements were similar to his previous TED talk below.

In addition to his thought-provoking message, he also dug deeply into the importance of supporting students in understanding their personal cultural identity. He showed a powerful video of students at a Maori school engaging in the customs of their culture. This school focuses on and measures the students' sense of identity as a part of their educational experience. With supporting data (below), the school demonstrates how focusing on the student's sense of identity also lead to long-term growth in their academic achievement. Most importantly, Jeff points out this change occurred after several years - a length of time that would be too long for many American schools to continue with any single strategy. I believe I will continue processing this keynote both professional and personally for a long time.

Slide from Final Keynote with Maori School Data.

I look forward to continue sharing my work related to this conference in the future and learning more about Improvement Science. If you have any tips of recommendations, I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments below!

​Yesterday, I was able to attend an Improvement Science Workshop put on by the Eagle Rock Professional Development Center. They offer a variety of professional development for schools across the country. We spent the day examining a problem of practice using improvement science. Thankfully, the presenter emailed out a Google Drive folder with all of the materials from the session in electronic form ahead of time. I was able to use a Chrome app called Copy Folder to make a copy of all of the folder materials at once (instead of the usual copying every file). This process was relatively easy and allowed my to select the folder directly from my Drive, name the new folder, copy sharing permissions (or not) and place it where I wanted in my Drive. I would recommend sharing this as a resource if you ever share a folder with participants and want them to make their own copy of multiple documents.

When I got assigned to my working group, I shared the folder with them and we were able to collaborate on many of the tasks from the workshop electronically. While my group members primarily engaged on the process using the posters and sticky-notes provided to us, I had the flexibility to express my thinking electronically and more importantly, capture all of my group's thinking in a way that would be easily referenced later. Oftentimes, posters from workshops are never referenced again and thrown away or recycled. By having an electronic archive, I know that our group will be far more likely to reference our work again. One document that gave me difficulty, however, was a Fishbone diagram. The electronic version was not very user-friendly for filling out electronically. Instead, I decided to use Lucidchart to create my own version of the diagram. I was satisfied with Lucidchart, but I'm not sure I would pay for a premium account. You are limited to 3 documents in a free Lucidchart account, but I think I will stick with the free account until I dig more into concept mapping software. Overall, it was very satisfying to engage with the workshop materials in a way that resonated with my working style. I am thankful that the team from Eagle Rock gave me the chance to explore what electronic engagement in a workshop can look like.

Do you give your participants the chance to engage electronically? What has worked? Share your stories in the comments!